Crazy Quilt Day 25

Today was warm!  After spending the afternoon with my family and enjoying a walk, I spent a fair amount of my evening working on the January block, hoping to avoid the heat (without air conditioning.)

(Sorry about the bad photo, the lighting was off.)

As nervous as I was about adding confetti, I ended up fairly happy with the end result.  Although, I need to remember I prefer to use a single strand of floss to attach beads so the threads do not look as bulky.  I used red, green, yellow, and light blue size 11/0 glass seed beads.  They were attached with the same DMC cotton flosses I used to create the streamers (red 321, green 701, yellow 307, and blue 806.)

Next, I wrote, "LET IT SNOW," using 2 strands of blue cotton DMC 322 and 1 strand of silver metallic thread.  I toyed with the idea of adding clear petite glass beads, but opted not to, as the silver sparkles in the fabric were decorative enough "snow."  As the picture shows, I used pins to divide the strip into equal sections for each letter and space.  Then I winged it, and stitched the letters in without a real pattern.

Only 6 steps to go!  (Click photo for larger image.)

It took me quite a while to get up the nerve to move onto the next section.  I had to decide between the two parts that intimidated me the most.  (I could opt to make my pattern more simple, but if I do not destroy the block with mistakes, it should turn out pretty cool.  You may be able to hear me chanting, "I think I can, I think I can...")  I decided to work on the snow-plopped letters next.  After typing "winter" out using the Gimp 2 CK Snow font, I measured the strip of fabric.  Then I used a piece of paper and divided the length into thirteen equal lengths (6 letters + 5 spaces between each letter + a space before and one after the word.)  Next, I drew the word, free-hand, onto the paper, enlarging each letter to the size of the space I made for it (and I used a fine-tipped sharpie so it would show through.)  Then, I turned the page over and traced the letters in reverse image.  I taped the page to a window and held the right side of my block against it, centering the word along the strip of fabric.  Using a #2 pencil, I traced the reverse image onto the back of the block.  It is a bit of work attempting to match my needle to the design on the back of my fabric, but so far it is turning out okay.  I stitched in the snow first, using cotton DMC white floss and a vertical satin stitch.  Then, I used dark blue cotton DMC 820 and a horizontal satin stitch to form the letter.  The "w" is almost finished, but it is time to call it a night.

Thanks again for stopping by!  I wish you a great week.
-Renee